3 Of The Best, In The World Of Mobile Gaming [Column]

In the world today we have Android and iPad tablets which offer great games, games which I’ve played vigorously on both.

With the iPad I was able to play two of my absolute favorite PC games, World of Goo and Plants vs Zombies — as they were ported over to the device — and another called Rage HD. Where on the Android, I chose some of Gameloft’s popular HD titles, even though they are also available on the Apple store for the iPad.

Playing games on an iPad is quite a unique experience, because as a handheld device it’s not at all small. On the iPad, the screen is bigger than most Net-books and the way in which developers implement touch is really intuitive.

My Android Galaxy Tablet, on the other hand, is a wee bit smaller than the iPad, but just as powerful. On the Android, gaming is slightly more comfortable as it feels like a PSP in your hand when you hold it in Landscape mode.

The iTunes store — think Apple and iPad — has much more content than the Android Market at the moment, but things are changing for the little green droid, as developers and applications are growing at a phenomenal pace. Also, an upside with Android is that you don’t have to be stuck with one market, as it was proven when Amazon started their Android Appstore last week.

World of Goo:

The first game I got for my iPad was an all time favourite: World of Goo. It’s exactly like the PC version, but I would have to say the touch interface just makes it a whole lot more appealing. Dragging more than one Gooball around with your fingers makes it feel as if you have more of a speedy impact on the game. While I never finished the PC version, I’m definitely planning on completing it on the iPad. World of Goo is a Must have title on any iPad, and for $4.99 it’s cheaper than the PC equivalent.

Plants vs Zombies:

The second game, of course, is none other than Plants vs Zombies. The iPad version is a lot better because of the touch controls. Plants vs Zombies supports multi-touch so you can grab a lot of ‘Sun’ at the same time, and also drag and plant a few of the plants at the same time. This feature increases your chances when dealing with those ‘Huge Wave’ sections you get pressured into. There is a version for both the iPad and iPhone on the iTunes Store. Unfortunately the iPad and iPhone version does not come with the Zen Garden and a few of us are a bit sad about this. Hopefully a future update will have the Zen Garden.

Gameloft Games:

This is a company worth mentioning as they have been producing some of the best quality mobile games for ages. Gameloft supports virtually every mobile platform you can think of, be it J2ME, iPad or Android. In this piece I’m only going to cover one of their titles, but I can say that I will always bring in at least one of their games for review.

Dungeon Hunter HD:

I cannot for the life of me believe that a game like this even exists for mobile phones. If you are a Dungeon Siege, Diablo or Sacred fan, this is a must have game for you. Dragon Hunter HD is a fully fledged RPG with awesome graphics, for your phone or tablet. It’s available on Android phones and tablets, as well as iPads and iPhones.

In the game you start off by choosing either a Warrior, Rogue or Mage, where you are then entered into a quick tutorial on how the game works. You can use a virtual analogue pad or tap on any area to go there. You also get action buttons, to fight and activate spells. One of the coolest features for the game is that you can position the buttons anywhere on the screen — try that on a PSP without a hammer.

At the moment, I’ve only played with a Warrior because I like toughies that can deal damage in an AoE fashion around my character. With this character, you get a faerie that follows you around, and now before you think it sounds a bit ‘gay’, it really does help to have the faerie as they bring a huge AoE active spell advantage. Free and collect more faeries with different abilities to help you on your quests. And on the topic of quests, there are so many and some even come with a bit of a comedic touch. It’s an excellent game, probably one of my favourites, and it only costs R20.

One great thing about mobile gaming is that games are cheap in price, and just so you know, most of them would have given your old PC a hard time as they are really high-tech.